Only Germany took this approach of combining the tank and the airplane into a combined arms force between the two world wars, even though all the combatants on the Western Front had direct experience with these technologies. Heinz Guderian, in reality, the blitzkrieg was an institutional response to solving the strategic problems encountered during World War I. Although history has frequently credited this innovation to Gen. To connect the two weapons, it employed new radio technology. To solve the problem of fire support to support the blitzkrieg, Germany looked to the airplane. Tanks would provide lethal and protected mobility that would give the German army longer reach. The solution to this mobility-at-distance problem was the internal combustion engine. Quite simply, an army cannot walk to Paris fast enough to keep the enemy off balance. Why is that? What the officers of the German General Staff eventually realized was that man and animal power could not negotiate the distances required for strategic victory before France, Britain, and the United States, blessed with interior lines, could bolster their defenses and thwart the strategic objectives of the German plans. Although the German Army was initially very successful in 19 at the tactical and operational levels, they failed strategically. What caused the failures of the initial offensive in 1914 - the much heralded von Schlieffen Plan - and the Spring Offensives of 1918, was the absence of operational mobility. Hans von Seeckt, studied what had happened to them in the Great War. Germany, on the defensive during most of the war, paid little attention to fielding its armor.Īfter World War I, the German General Staff, led by Gen. In short, the tank was an infantry support weapon. This is how France and the United States used tanks - taking on entrenched machine guns to allow forward movement by conquering infantry. ![]() Most others thought of the tank as a solution to the problem of how to move infantry forward on a fire-swept battlefield. They imagined it would easily rumble through enemy defenses and press into his rear areas, causing chaos. Some, most notably British tank advocate J.F.C. Even at this early date, there were differing opinions about its utility. Tanks first appeared in World War I as a means of providing a survivable maneuver option on the deadly battlefields of the Great War. ![]() The question before us now is whether the tank is the modern equivalent of the battleship or the horse. And the weapon needs to be retired, perhaps to a nice stud farm where it can recall the glories of the past. In the case of the horse cavalry, the role has ended. The naval gunfire mission persisted, however, albeit from smaller vessels. Navy battleships were in active service until 1990, when the costs to maintain them clearly outweighed their utility. In the case of the battleship, the platform may change, but not the function. What is the point to these anecdotes? There are two. ![]() Marshall used his executive-order authority, given after Pearl Harbor, to get rid of all the horses in the Army - and Herr. Herr was an obstacle to modernizing the Army with tanks, insisting that he would accept no increase in armor at the expense of horse-cavalry strength. The horse, however, was a different kind of problem for the Army. Navy was able to accommodate both the battleship and aircraft carrier in World War II, although the battleship mostly was relied upon to provide fire support, rather than crossing the T against an enemy battleline.
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